1. Field of the Invention
Aspects of the present invention relate to an image forming apparatus, and more particularly, to an image forming apparatus having a scanning function.
2. Description of the Related Art
Image forming apparatuses that provide scanning features generally include scanning units and printing units. The scanning units scan a document and convert the scanned document to a digital image. The printing units form an image corresponding to print received printing data on a printing medium.
Flatbed-type scanners are widely used as scanning units. The flatbed-type scanner scans a document placed flat on a glass substrate, and, as such, the dimensions of the floor space or footprint of the scanner are greater than those of the document to be scanned. Further, it is difficult to reduce the dimensions of the scanning unit so as to decrease the footprint of the image forming apparatus with respect to the floor space. However, the printing unit may perform printing while bending a printing medium and moving the printing medium along a curved printing path. Accordingly, it is possible to make a length of the floor space (i.e., footprint) of the printing unit less than a length of the printing medium, the length of the printing medium being with respect to a direction in which the printing medium moves. As such, the dimensions of the floor space of the printing unit may be less than those of the scanning unit.
FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a conventional image forming apparatus 1 having a scanning function. In FIG. 1, the conventional image forming apparatus 1 includes a printing unit 5 and a scanning unit 3 disposed above the printing unit 5. The scanning unit 3 of the conventional image forming apparatus 1 of FIG. 1 has larger dimensions in a horizontal direction than the printing unit 5. In other words, a periphery of the scanning unit 3 extends further in some or all horizontal directions than a periphery of the printing unit 5. As described above, a flatbed-type scanner is used as the scanning unit 3, and the scanning unit 3 may not have the same dimension of the floor space as the printing unit 5. Further, an operation panel 7 arranged to operate the image forming apparatus 1 is disposed at a side of the scanning unit 3, which increases further the horizontal dimensions of the scanning unit 3.
Reduction of the size of the conventional image forming apparatus 1 configured as described above is limited due to the size requirements of the scanning unit 3. Additionally, in the conventional image forming apparatus 1, a top surface of a scanner of the scanning unit 3 is not horizontally aligned with a top surface of the operation panel 7 making for a surface on which it is difficult to place and stably support another object. As such, the space in which the conventional image forming apparatus 1 is mounted is not usable.